I. Field
The present disclosure relates generally to communication, and more specifically to techniques for restricting access to a wireless system.
II. Background
Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication content, such as voice, video, packet data, messaging, broadcast, and the like. These wireless networks may be multiple-access networks capable of supporting multiple users by sharing the available network resources. Examples of such multiple-access networks include: Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) networks, Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) networks, Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) networks, Orthogonal FDMA (OFDMA) networks, and Single-Carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) networks. A wireless communication network may also be referred to as a wide area network (WAN). For example, a 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE), is a WAN standard that provides high speed data access, with latency on the order of 30 ms.
In contrast to a WAN, a local area network (LAN) may be provided wirelessly (WLAN). A WLAN may offer high data speeds, and decreased latency (on the order of 10 ms). A WLAN may be used to interconnect proximate devices by employing widely used networking protocols, such as Wireless Fidelity (WiFi), or, more generally, a protocol selected from the IEEE 802.11 wireless protocol family.
Proximate WiFi devices that are authorized to use a particular WLAN may access that WLAN to determine their current location with respect to the area serviced by the WLAN, to thereby enable use of that WLAN. More specifically, through transmissions of respective access points, and such as to enable WLAN communication, authorized WiFi devices may learn certain characteristics of the respective access points of the WLAN (e.g. the access points' physical location, transmit power, beam shape, and the like). Typical access points may implement known cryptographic techniques to secure such WLAN positioning and communications. Despite this use of cryptography in the known art, unauthorized devices may still overcome these known cryptographic techniques to determine positioning within the WLAN, thereby enabling unauthorized use of the associated WLAN.
Therefore, it may be desirable to substantially eliminate this unauthorized use, such as by employing alternate encryption techniques.